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N.B.A. Talks Yield Progress but No Breakthrough Yet

Derek Fisher and Billy Hunter, left, are back at the bargaining table.Credit
Brendan Mcdermid/Reuters

Pushing aside ultimatums, threats and caustic rhetoric, N.B.A. owners and players returned to the bargaining table Wednesday for a 12-hour session that produced modest movement, but nothing close to a final deal.

The talks ended around 1 a.m. Thursday and will resume at noon.

“The fact that we don’t have a deal obviously let’s you know that there’s still a lot of work to be done on the system,” said Derek Fisher, the players union president. “We’re going to meet again tomorrow to give it our best effort, but we’re not sure if that will be enough.”

In theory, the players were working against an ultimatum: to accept the N.B.A.’s most recent proposal by 5 p.m. Wednesday, or have it replaced by a significantly worse offer. But once talks resumed, the parties effectively “stopped the clock,” Commissioner David Stern said.

Failure to reach a deal in the next day or so could still trigger the N.B.A.’s “reset” proposal, which would threaten the rest of the season. But as long as talks continue, there is hope on both sides that a deal can be struck, and the four-month lockout resolved.

The potential parameters for a deal changed Tuesday, when the union signaled that it might accept the N.B.A.’s proposed 50-50 split of revenues, if the league would compromise in other areas. That move put the onus back on the owners and pushed the parties back to the table, just three days after talks collapsed.

The union wants the league to drop or modify several provisions that would limit free-agent movement. The league wants to ban luxury tax-paying teams from making sign-and-trade deals and from using the full midlevel exception, worth $5 million. The union fears that those rules, combined with a more punitive tax, would strangle the free-agent market.

Any further economic concessions from the union are now predicated on the league moving on those issues. Yet there was only incremental movement, despite the 12 hours of talks, according to a person briefed on the negotiations.

The players have been earning 57 percent of league revenues and have already offered to reduce that share to 51 percent. If they move to 50, it would represent a $280 million annual reduction — and a giveback of approximately $3 billion over a 10-year deal. The union believes that should warrant a compromise on the system issues.

Asked if the league showed that flexibility, Fisher said, “Not as much as we like. But that’s why we’re here.” He added, “Because we believe once the dollars are set, the system is just a matter of working conditions for players and having choices and rights within the system. It’s not about getting more dollars for players once the economic split is resolved.”

Despite the union’s gesture, league officials are resistant to trading dollars for free-agency rules.

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“The competitive issues are independent of the economic issues,” said the deputy commissioner Adam Silver, “and our goal is to have a system in which all 30 teams are competing for championships; and, if well managed, they have an opportunity to break even or make a profit. We don’t see the ability to break even or make a profit as a tradeoff for the ability to field a competitive team.”

Any deal will almost certainly be predicated on a 50-50 split of revenues. Stern is already dealing with a backlash from hardline faction of owners who wanted to cap players at 47 percent.

“If they’re going to get a deal, it’s going to be at 50-50,” said one person involved in the talks. “Ownership is willing to lose the season rather than go any higher.”

That leaves the union with little room to make a deal.

This round of negotiations is being conducted with small groups on each side. Stern was joined by Silver, the San Antonio Spurs owner Peter Holt — who heads the N.B.A.’s labor relations committee — and the league’s top two lawyers, Rick Buchanan and Dan Rube. Representing the union were Fisher and the executive director Billy Hunter, along with the union’s outside counsel Jeff Kessler, its outside economist, Kevin Murphy, and its lead attorney, Ron Klempner.

Although a group of strident owners, most of them from small markets, have been dictating the N.B.A.’s position, Stern has the authority to make the necessary compromises, according to a person involved in the talks on the league side. “David is going to do what needs to be done,” the person said.

The union has its own concerns. A disillusioned faction of players and agents is already collecting signatures on a petition to dissolve the union, an extreme measure that would shift the battle to the courts and probably prolong the crisis. If those players are upset with the terms of a handshake deal, they could attempt to defeat it at the ballot box and continue the decertification effort.

A month of games has been canceled so far. Based on the league’s need for a four-week preparation period — to finalize the deal, hold free agency and training camps — the first two weeks of December are already threatened.

REBOUNDS

Jeffrey Kessler, the chief negotiator for the players union, apologized Wednesday for making a racially charged comment about N.B.A. owners. Discussing the taut labor negotiations between the league and the union, he had told The Washington Post that the league was treating the players “like plantation workers.”

“The comments that I made to The Washington Post Monday night took place quite late, at the end of a lengthy interview,” Kessler said Wednesday. “And looking back, I believe that the words I used were inappropriate, and I am going to communicate my apologies for that to the N.B.A. and to the commissioner, who I will call and indicate that I apologize for that choice of words. The important thing for the parties is to get together and try to make a deal, and we have to put aside any other types of distractions.”

A version of this article appears in print on November 10, 2011, on Page B13 of the New York edition with the headline: N.B.A. Talks Yield Progress But No Breakthrough Yet. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe